Understanding COPD

Having COPD often means you can run into some difficulties in everyday life, just doing normal things like eating or sleeping. It can be hard to anything when you can't catch your breath, or when the simplest things get you winded.

There are some ways around these issues, however, and you can use them to adapt and cope.

When you get short of breath during a meal...

This can happen because your stomach is pushing up against your lungs, which are likely enlarged slightly from being damaged. Even if they aren't enlarged but you're out of breath, eating can make you feel even more out of breath because as you eat, your stomach is pressing against your diaphragm.

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If you or someone you know has COPD, there are plenty of things you will need to know and remember to help you deal with this disease. COPD doesn't have to rule your life, but if you know the facts, you can use these to make your quality of life better.

What Caused Your COPD

Getting to the bottom of what caused your COPD will help you remove yourself from these factors. Smoking tobacco is the number one cause, with over 80% of COPD cases being caused by smoking. The second main cause of COPD is air pollution, such as the kind in big cities with a lot of smog and toxins in the air. The third and most rare cause, is a genetic defect that causes only 1% of all known COPD cases worldwide.

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Overall, COPD is now the third leading cause of death in the United States, trailing closely behind heart disease and cancer. A startling and increasing number of women have been dying from this disease, the numbers quadrupling over the last 30 years. Since 2000 more women than men have been dying from COPD.

Why are so many more women dying from COPD than men of the same age?

For one thing, COPD is one of those diseases that can be severely misdiagnosed, or completely overlooked until much later, when it has finally become obvious. You might not even suspect that anything is wrong, until it has progressed into the severe stage. After you've been diagnosed, you may have already been walking around with it for years.

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Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) is currently the third leading cause of death in the United States, preceded only by heart disease and cancer. It also encompasses two types of chronic lung diseases – emphysema and chronic bronchitis.

Healthcare officials have broken COPD into 4 stages: mild, moderate, severe and very severe. The stages are determined by tests administered by your doctor, such a spirometry tests and arterial blood gas tests. From these tests, your doctor will be able to tell you at which stage it has advanced to, and how it should be treated. The earlier it's caught, the easier it will be to treat it and hopefully stop it from progressing.

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Depending on how severe your diagnosis of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, you should be able to at least put the progression of this disease at a standstill, as long as you make a few healthy lifestyle decisions. You won't be able to cure yourself of this disease, only because you can't reverse the damage that has been done to your lungs. Making everyone aware of COPD is the first step in making sure the disease doesn't advance so far, that you need to be using a home oxygen concentrator for most of the day. To stay healthy, you will need to ask yourself a few questions.

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Living with COPD can be challenging because it can dramatically impact your life. A diagnosis of COPD can lead to feelings of helplessness and hopelessness and is the disease progresses, social interaction, and physical activity can decrease as they can become difficult.

Many people with chronic illness know how crucial it is to stay on top of the newest developments on what they've been diagnosed with. How else would you know about the last and best in medications? Some people find comfort in speaking COPD and find supports group to be beneficial to their overall well-being and health.

By staying informed, talking about the disease, and continually learning about ways to cope, you can slow the progression of the disease and continue to live, one day at a time, to the fullest extent possible.

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Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, or COPD, is a disease that is actually characterized by two lung diseases. Chronic bronchitis and emphysema are two similar lung diseases that cause obstruction in the airways, making breathing more difficult. If either or both are diagnosed, then the individual has COPD.

With chronic bronchitis, there is inflammation in the lining of the bronchial tubes. The inflammation reduces air flow and causes the production of excessive phlegm. Over time, the chronic inflammation leads to scarring and thickening of the tissue, along with a permanent cough.

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